


The Color of the Sky

by jtspz1347



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-25
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2020-01-31 13:04:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18591823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jtspz1347/pseuds/jtspz1347
Summary: It was when he felt a hand on his shoulder that he realized that it was over. He felt the hand drag him downwards, and downwards was suddenly upwards, his body breaking away from the earth as the crumbling surface gave a defeated scream.And it was then, and only then, that the dirt fell from his mouth, and he began to scream himself.





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! A big thank you to everyone who read my first fic. This one will be updated about once a week, but hopefully I'll have Chapter One done before that since the prologue is so short.

He wasn’t sure how far below the surface he was.  
He wasn’t sure how far below the surface he would go.  
Perhaps he would just continue to sink, forever, drowning.  
If he was not who he was now, he might have thought of his family, or thought to pray to some gentle god he would have thought existed. Instead, he thought of only a sky he could no longer remember the color of.  
At times, he thought of the Archivist. Those feelings were murky, a rage he could not feel any longer; everything was muted, including his rage. All that was left in him was a semblance of fear.  
In the beginning, he had fought to keep his eyes open, thinking that for a brief, agonizingly hopeful moment that he might glimpse a flash of blue from under the mud. Now, he wasn’t sure if they were open or shut, with the dirt so heavy and close he couldn’t tell the difference.  
He missed the sky. He missed the small flat he rented, and the balcony he watched the sunrises from, and the tea he made himself in the mornings though he didn’t need to drink.  
He even missed the Spiral.  
He couldn’t dream; he couldn’t even sleep. He was glad for this, in a way-- if he could dream, he would only come crashing back to reality once he woke again. He couldn’t breathe. Perhaps he should have been glad for this as well, since he didn’t need to breathe, but he couldn’t scream without breath, not even to clear the mud from his throat.  
He could feel, however, and wished to God he couldn’t. Every inch of his being felt acutely each particle of dirt that pressed on him. The moment he tried to focus on any single part of him, however, the feeling slipped out of his mind like water through a sieve. It was all-encompassing.

It went on this way for a longer time than he ever believed existed. And then, all at once, he felt a shift, as if he was sinking further and faster than he was before. It was over-- whether a Fairchild had come to rescue him or the Buried had decided it was bored with him, he wasn’t sure. He only knew that the soil around him was cold. Before, he couldn’t feel whether it was hot or cold, or wet or dry, he couldn’t tell a single thing about it except that it was.  
It was when he felt a hand on his shoulder that he realized that it was over. He felt the hand drag him downwards, and downwards was suddenly upwards, his body breaking away from the earth as the crumbling surface gave a defeated scream.  
And it was then, and only then, that the dirt fell from his mouth, and he began to scream himself.


	2. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! Thank you for all the interest in this fic! As a clarification, this fic is not two chapters, I'm just new to AO3 so I didn't know how to format it properly. Enjoy!

“Are you alright?”  
The voice was mild and soft-spoken, but still too loud all the same. After his time in the earth with nothing but silence, it hurt his ears to hear any noise, much less a voice in his ear.  
He tried to say so, that it was too loud, but all that came out was a croak.  
“Hello? Can you hear me? Can you breathe? Oh, God, Elias is going to kill me.”  
He was staring blankly up at the sky now, as if it had no meaning to him. The voice was still too loud, it was hurting his ears as it raised in pitch and volume. The rage he had long forgotten began to ache dully in his chest again.  
“Too loud,” he whispered, but whoever was speaking didn’t hear him.  
The voice wasn’t speaking to him anymore, but to someone else. “Tim, call me back. I know you’re not working. I think… I think I need help. I might be in trouble.”  
All at once, it was like the world finally fell back into focus. The dull ache of rage was returning in full now, and he struggled to sit up, eyes now scanning his surroundings. The voice belonged to a tall, stocky man who had his back to him, still talking anxiously into his phone.  
“Just, call me back,” the man finished, and ended the call, fidgeting with his phone, so lost in thought that he didn’t notice Mike struggling to his feet. He did, however, notice the sudden and violent feeling when Mike decided to turn his rage on him. The feeling of vertigo made him stagger, and Mike didn’t need to know his thoughts to know how the man’s stomach must be turning, his heart beating fast against his ribcage.   
The man turned to him with fear in his eyes, the action clearly taking great effort. He took a step forward and tripped over himself, falling to his knees. Still, he looked up at Mike; clearly, this man wasn’t a Fairchild.  
“Finally, you shut up,” he said with a slight twinge of satisfaction. He drew himself up to his full height; the man flinched.  
“Now,” he asked, “who the fuck are you?”

Martin Blackwood was having a very and truly horrible day.

At four in the morning, he had received a phone call from the person he least expected-- and least wanted-- to hear from. The Caller ID said in clear, dreadful letters: Elias Bouchard.  
“Martin, I’m glad you’re awake,” had been the first words he had heard after he picked up the phone. He had initially decided to let it ring, but the caller had called not once, but four times.  
“I suppose I didn’t really have a choice, did I?” He knew that antagonizing Elias was most likely going to backfire, but he couldn’t help himself from snapping at him.  
“I need you to come in to work early, please.”  
Martin took the phone away from his ear, took a moment to swear under his breath, and put the phone back up to his face.   
“What time? I can make it there in an hour or so, if I rush--”  
“Now,” Elias interrupted, “would be best.”  
Martin didn’t bother to move the phone this time when he swore. Elias chose to ignore it, continuing on.  
“Come straight to my office when you get here. Get here as soon as possible.”  
With this, Elias hung up, and Martin sank back onto his pillow. Whatever Elias wanted him to do, it couldn’t be much worse than being alone with him before the sun was even up.

As soon as he walked into Elias’ office, he knew it was going to be much worse than expected.  
Elias wasn’t in his office. On the desk, however, there was a cardboard box, filled to the brim with handwritten notes and tapes upon tapes, all shoved a bit unceremoniously into the box.  
“Good morning, Martin. Thank you for joining me,” Elias said from behind him, carrying another box filled with notes. “This is the last of the what you’ll need for this morning.”  
Martin couldn’t help himself from being a bit sarcastic as he replied. He was tired, hungry, and his socks were wet from stepping off the curb and straight into a puddle.  
“What would you like me to do with them? Read them? Put them in a photo album? How about burning them?”  
Perhaps he was a bit too sarcastic this morning.   
Elias raised his eyebrow at Martin’s tone. “Actually, burning them is exactly what I would like you to do.”  
“I— what?”  
“Burn them.” Elias’ tone was pleasant, as always. He was smiling placidly at Martin as if he had only asked him to file the notes away.  
Confused, he pressed Elias for answers.  
“Why?”  
“Well, Tim is incompetent, I don’t trust the others, and I certainly can’t do it myself.”   
“I meant, why are we burning them?” He picked up one of the papers with long, scrawled script all over it. He recognized the handwriting. “These— these are Jon’s notes, why do you need to—“  
“Martin,” Elias interrupted him. His smile was just as calm as before. “Do you truly think it’s a good idea? To ask so many questions?”  
Martin’s confusion had been slowly turning to anxiety, and here it bubbled up inside his stomach, making him stammer. “I— no, I suppose not. I just thought—“  
“Ah.” Elias interrupted him again. “You thought. Perhaps it would be better not to do that.”  
At this, anxiety changed to anger. “I’ll tell Jon, then, what you’ve done.”   
Elias smiled even wider at this. “And do what, exactly? I can make you burn them. What will you tell him then, that you burned his work? What excuse will you give?”  
Martin had no answer. Elias sensed his victory and picked up the box, shoving it into his hands. “Right, better get on with it then. It might be easier to burn them before the others get here.”  
Martin still said nothing, but obediently took the boxes and left, Elias’s words still in his mind.

He was sitting very still, about to begin burning the notes, when a name on the paper caught his eye.  
Crew, it said, in Jon’s handwriting. When Jon had come back the Archives, he had said that name in a shaking voice. The man he has interviewed, the man that Daisy had murdered.  
It gave him pause, and with Elias’ condescending smile in his mind, he began to read.

By the time he was finished, it was well after the sun was up. He was lost in his own thoughts of the mysterious Michael Crew, who had willingly given himself over to something terrifying. It wasn’t until Basira came in that he realized that it was late into the morning— too late, in fact, for him to burn the notes. He shoved them into his desk drawer and greeted Basira as normally as possible.   
His day went on as usual, but his thoughts kept straying back to Michael Crew, and his statement. When Basira came over to grab yet another book for her to read, he asked her about him.  
“Basira?”  
“Hm?” She was distracted, a bit distant, but friendly nonetheless.  
“What happened to Michael Crew?”  
She set the book she had chosen down, and looked at him with a curious look. “Who?”  
“The— the man who Daisy killed, before…” he trailed off. “You know. The man who died.”  
“She took him out to the woods, shot him, and buried him. Suppose that’s about it.”  
“But he’s one of those… people, isn’t he?”  
Basira shot him another curious look. “Was he? It’s none of my concern.”  
Was.  
From all he had read, Martin doubted the man had died so easily, from a gunshot. He asked a final question. “Where did Daisy bury him?”  
She sighed. “If I tell you, will you leave me alone about it?”  
He smiled to himself, and said yes.

It had become an even more horrible day after this.   
Martin left at around two, avoiding everyone he could. The Archives had been tense, since Jon returned, and no one could blame him for leaving early. The rain from early in the morning had stopped, leaving the air heavy and wet, weighing on him as he drove to the spot Basira had told him about.  
The air was worse when he got to the spot; it felt as if it pressed down on him, invading his lungs, making it hard to breathe. He knew he was at the right spot when he felt most as if he should leave, as if he should run before he was caught up in the air, and whatever made it so heavy.  
There was a bare patch of ground, and it was there he dug. The earth seemed to shudder with each movement of his shovel, the air heavy enough to choke him.  
And there, only a foot or so below the surface, he found him.   
At first, Martin thought he was dead; his eyes were open, his mouth was open, and his chest was still. He pulled him out of the ground anyway. If anything he had read was accurate, even dead he would dread being trapped in the earth.  
It was this freedom from the earth that made him stir. Michael Crew turned over, spitting up soil, and screamed. The act was so surprising that Martin screamed as well, backing away from man. It was then that he realized he had just dug up a man who seemed to have no problem with killing people, a man who was now disoriented, hurt, and most certainly unhappy with this turn of events.  
“Are you alright?” he asked, his voice rising from anxiety. The man tried to make a sound but failed. “Hello? Can you hear me? Can you breathe? Oh, God, Elias is going to kill me.” There was panic in his chest now, and he turned away from the man in front of him, fingers hovering over the numbers on his phone. There was no one that he really, truly, trusted with this, but he knew something was about to happen.  
After a couple of moments, he called Tim. He got the voicemail immediately.  
“Tim, call me back. I know you’re not working. I think…” he glanced back at Michael Crew, who was staring blankly at the sky, though his fingers twitched ever so slightly, “I think I need help. I might be in trouble.” And then the words poured from his mouth like he couldn’t stop them. “If you get this and don’t hear from me again, I need you to take care of my mother. Please.” He swallowed, the words hanging in the air and in the empty silence on the other end. “Just, call me back.”  
He hung up, holding his phone in trembling hands. He didn’t want to die. He had heard about what Michael Crew had done to Jon, and yet here he was, so reckless, so stupid.  
It hit him then, the feeling. He thought at first it was a panic attack; he couldn’t swallow, his stomach turning and his heart in his throat. His eyes started to water, and he tried to cry out, but only choked instead.  
Turning around, he fell to his knees and saw Michael Crew standing above him, with blue eyes full of rage. “Finally,” he said, “you shut up.”  
Martin flinched; he was still falling, and he knew it was only a matter of time until he hit the ground.  
“Now who the fuck are you?”  
And now, this was truly the worst, most horrible day.


End file.
